"Pieces of the Island"-An English Translation

Uris Nunez Gonzalez

In the video above, members of the Rosa Parks Movement for Civil Rights march through the streets of Santa Clara, marking the first protest of this dissident group in 2012. During the last days of 2011, the female dissidents belonging to the Movement announced that they would carry out a protest every first day of each month “as part of a permanent campaign called ‘Marches for Freedom and Against Impunity“, according to declarations made by Idania Yanez Contreras, member of the group and also president of the Central Opposition Coalition.

In her declarations, Yanez Contreras explained that these demonstrations will consist of “peaceful marches to specific government institutions, in order to hand in formal documents demanding the immediate and unconditional freedom of every single one of the political prisoners in Cuba, as well as the immediate end of repression which the Cuban people and the internal Resistance are subjected to“. Other activities which will be carried out during these civil demonstrations will be to “carry out pilgrimages to mausoleums, statues, and other locations of patriotic significance in order to pay tribute to our martyrs“.

The Rosa Parks Movement’s first public protest of 2012 was carried out in the central province of Santa Clara but the dissidents have plans to “extend the protests to numerous provinces and cities throughout the country“. The members of the group are inviting the rest of the Resistance organizations made up by women, and the opposition in general, to “support this initiative in one way or another, because our demands constitute a common goal among all the Cuban democratic forces in and out of the island“, declared Yanez Contreras.

The dissident group also sent out a letter outlining these points. The declaration was signed by Sara Marta Fonseca Quevedo (delegate in the western region), Damaris Moya Portieles (delegate in the central region), Idania Yánez Contreras (executive and president of the Central Opposition Coalition), Uris Núñez González (delegate in the Ciego-Camaguey provinces), Marta Díaz Rondón (vice-president), Berta Antúnez Pernet (representative in exile) and Yris Tamara Pérez Aguilera (president).